This invention relates to the field of gel-filled caps and in particular to those gel-filled caps used in connection with the terminating and sealing of telecommunication wires.
In the termination of electrically conductive wires, particularly telecommunication wires, to a substrate, it is often necessary to individually protect each termination, as opposed to the entire substrate, from the elements, including moisture, insects and vermin. Protective gel-filled covers have been proposed in Debbaut U.S. patent application Ser. No. 434,011, filed Oct. 12, 1982, now U.S. Pat. No. 4,600,261; serial number 504,000, filed June 13, 1983, now U.S. Pat. No. 4,634,207; serial number 507,433, filed June 23, 1983, now abandoned; serial number 756,559, filed July 17, 1985, now abandoned; and serial number 892,519, filed July 31, 1986, the disclosures of which are incorporated by reference herein.
While the above Debbaut protective covers perform well in practice, it has been found that under certain conditions there is imperfect sealing (and therefore imperfect protection) of the termination. The imperfect sealing primarily results from the fact that when the protective cover is placed upon the terminal, especially with certain terminal configurations and wire types, the protective cover may not seal well around the wire which is to be terminated. Accordingly, a leak path around the wire for moisture ingress may occur. This may be the case even if the protective cover is filled with a suitable gel or other encapsulant.
In practice, the workman has partially solved the problem by manually cutting a notch in the end of the protection cover. When the notch receives the wire, the sealing of the protective cover is improved.
However, this solution is unsatisfactory for at least two reasons. The first is that the notch may not always be accurately cut so that sealing is not always optimized. The second is that manually cutting each protective cover is an extremely onerous task due to the fact that millions of these protective covers are installed every year.
Accordingly, the need has arisen for an improved protective cover wherein sealing may be efficiently and effectively enhanced.
Therefore, it is an object of the invention to provide such a cover.
This and other objects of the invention will become more apparent after referring to the following description considered in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.